Late Monday Zulily, which specializes in short-term sales of goods and clothing for women and children, reported a fourth-quarter profit, excluding one-time items,of 10 cents a share, on revenue of $257 million … . Wall Street analysts had forecast Zulily to earn 4 cents a share on revenue of $226 million.

In case you missed it, The Wall Street Journal has published an in-depth story about Pimco, and it’s generating lots of buzz.

The article looks at the showdown between bond king Bill Gross, who co-founded Pimco, and Mohamed El-Erian. An amazing paragraph from the story:

Late last year, in front of a number of traders, Mr. Gross said, “if only Mohamed would let me, I could run all the $2 trillion myself…I’m Secretariat,” referring to the famed thoroughbred. “Why would you bet on anyone other than Secretariat?”

You can read an excerpt of the story here. Reacting to the WSJ article, Felix Salmon at Reuters says Gross should retire.

“I would expect more selling pressure today, because a failure to break through the 1,850 level yesterday is a bearish sign,” says JJ Kinahan, chief strategist at TD Ameritrade.

What was interesting about yesterday’s rally is that it was not reinforced by the 10-year Treasury yields, nor by the Vix index. Bond yields did not move much and the Vix percentage change was not as pronounced.

The top performer on the S&P 500 is Frontier Communications Corp
/quotes/zigman/7729100/delayed/quotes/nls/ftrFTR - up more than 10%. The telecoms company which operates mainly in rural and small-to-medium sized towns reported a more than two-fold increase in profit in fourth-quarter.

Shares in Delta Air Lines Inc rose 2.8% after Stifel Nicolaus initiated coverage of the company with a buy rating, highlighting its “well-balanced cash-deployment strategy” and “management’s willingness to think outside the box.”

The S&P 500 may be eyeing record levels again, but a look at the sectors shows that buying is mostly defensive. Seven of 10 main sectors are in green, with consumer staples and utilities leading gains.

“Today is another relatively slow day for broad market news although we could see action in specific stocks off of company developments,” wrote Colin Cieszynski, senior market analyst at CMC Markets.

Market sentiment toward China has remained unsettled overnight. Chinese indices took another big hit, while copper and CNY also continued to retreat.

In the lack of other news China has been getting the blame for today’s pullbacks in Europe and North America although these moves may be more technically driven. In the last few days, indices in France and the UK plus the S&P 500 have tested or broken through their 52-week and channel highs and may be getting tired.

The S&P in particular did not show much enthusiasm for going much higher suggesting that a proper catalyst beyond money flows may be needed to drive a new upleg and without one, markets may be vulnerable once the tax deadlines for retirement accounts pass.

The stock market has been undecided about today’s news. Earlier, a report on home prices showed a dip, while the general trend pointed to a slower growth in the housing market in the months ahead.

Consumer confidence also dipped.

Most of the economic data in the past two months have been impacted by severe weather. But just how much the weather is to blame? Irwin Kellner, chief economist at MarketWatch thinks it is all due to cold and stormy weather. For more, read his column here.

Tesla’s quest to disrupt a trillion $ car industry offers an adjacent opportunity to disrupt a trillion $ electric utility industry. If it can be a leader in commercializing battery packs, investors may never look at Tesla the same way again.

But the decision comes with certain challenges, most notably how to navigate in an environment where Web censorship is the norm rather than an exception, according to Chief Executive Jeff Weiner in a blog post.

Samsung Electronics Co./quotes/zigman/189457/realtimeKR:005930 unveiled its latest smartphone Galaxy S5 at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona Monday. The new device is likely to start shipping by the end of March, according to analysts at Nomura Securities.

The blue-chip index was trading 47 points higher at session highs this morning and is now down 43 points. The losses are led by Boeing, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan. More than two thirds of 30 components are in negative territory.

Among the soundbites that came from a lengthy and, at times, bizarre interview with Bill Gross on Tuesday afternoon, was the fact that the bond fund manager started a conga line on the trading floor “to let employees know it was okay to scream and shout and let it all out.”

…

Gross didn’t take issue so much with the facts of the article as much as the tone, which he said overstated the firm’s supposedly tense culture.

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